''Bear 71'' is a 20-minute 2012 interactive

National Film Board of Canada The National Film Board of Canada (NFB; french: Office national du film du Canada (ONF)) is Canada's public film and digital media producer and distributor. An agency of the Government of Canada, the NFB produces and distributes documentary f ...

(NFB)

web documentary A web documentary, interactive documentary, or multimedia documentary is a documentary production that differs from the more traditional forms—video, audio, photographic—by applying a full complement of multimedia tools. The interactive multim ...

by Leanne Allison and Jeremy Mendes about a female grizzly bear in Banff National Park named Bear 71, who had a

tracking collar GPS animal tracking is a process whereby biologists, scientific researchers or conservation agencies can remotely observe relatively fine-scale movement or migratory patterns in a free-ranging wild animal using the Global Positioning System ( ...

implanted at the age of three and was watched via

trail camera A remote camera, also known as a trail camera or game camera, is a camera placed by a photographer in areas where the photographer generally cannot be at the camera to snap the shutter. This includes areas with limited access, tight spaces where a ...

s in the park from 2001 to 2009. The documentary follows the bear, exploring the connections between the human and animal world, and the far-ranging effects that human settlements, roads and railways have on wildlife.

Production

Through the work of Leanne Allison's husband and film collaborator Karston Heuer ('' Being Caribou'', '' Finding Farley''), a park ranger at Banff, Allison was aware of thousands of hours of wildlife footage captured on remote trail cameras in the park. After obtaining permission from researchers, including Parks Canada, Alberta Tourism, Parks and Recreation, and Montana State University, she spent months sifting through these low-res images. Allison originally pitched the idea to the NFB as a traditional documentary.

Rob McLaughlin Rob McLaughlin is a Canadian journalist and digital media producer who is currently the executive producer of the National Film Board of Canada's Digital Studio in Vancouver. McLaughlin was announced as the head of the NFB studio in May 2016, havi ...

, then head of the NFB's digital studio in

Vancouver Vancouver ( ) is a major city in western Canada, located in the Lower Mainland region of British Columbia. As the List of cities in British Columbia, most populous city in the province, the 2021 Canadian census recorded 662,248 people in the ...

, suggested an interactive project. The story was written by J.B. MacKinnon, co-author of the '' 100 Mile Diet''. The bear is voiced by

Mia Kirshner Mia Kirshner (born January 25, 1975) is a Canadian actress, writer and social activist. She is known for television roles as Mandy in '' 24'' (2001–2005), as Jenny Schecter in ''The L Word'' (2004–2009), as Amanda Grayson in '' Star Trek: Di ...

. The two co-directors were remote workers: Allison was based in

Canmore, Alberta Canmore is a town in Alberta, Canada, located approximately west of Calgary near the southeast boundary of Banff National Park. It is located in the Bow Valley within Alberta's Rocky Mountains. The town shares a border with Kananaskis Countr ...

and Mendes was based in Vancouver. The website was designed by Toronto-based digital design firm Jam3. The film had a budget of $350,000.

Release

''Bear 71'' went live on the NFB website on January 19, 2012. It was also the subject of an

installation art Installation art is an artistic genre of three-dimensional works that are often site-specific and designed to transform the perception of a space. Generally, the term is applied to interior spaces, whereas exterior interventions are often called ...

exhibit at the

2012 Sundance Film Festival The 2012 Sundance Film Festival took place from January 19 until January 29, 2012 in Park City, Utah. 64 short films were selected for the festival from 7,675 submissions, including 27 international shorts from 3,592 submissions. Non-competition ...

's New Frontier program beginning January 20, and at the

Utah Museum of Contemporary Art The Utah Museum of Contemporary Art (UMOCA), formerly known as the Salt Lake Art Center, is a contemporary art museum. Located in Downtown Salt Lake City, the museum presents rotating exhibitions by local, national and international contemporary ...

or via webcam through the documentary’s website. The webdoc features a map of Banff National Park that allows users to follow Bear 71's movements by scrolling over the cameras, and look at other users by activating the computer's webcam. In April 2012, DOXA Documentary Film Festival opened its 2012 season with a public showing of the film at St. Andrew's Wesley Church, with a live musical accompaniment by

Tim Hecker Tim Hecker is a Canadian electronic musician, producer, composer, and sound artist. His work, spanning atmospheric ambient albums such as ''Harmony in Ultraviolet'' (2006), ''Ravedeath, 1972'' (2011) and ''Virgins'' (2013), has been widely cr ...

Loscil Loscil is the electronic/ ambient music project of Scott Morgan from Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada. Morgan launched the project in Vancouver in 1998 while a member of the multimedia collective Multiplex, which curated audiovisual events at a ...

, and

Heather McIntosh The Instruments is the musical project of Heather McIntosh, cellist in a number of Athens, Georgia groups including Circulatory System, Elf Power, and Japancakes. They released three albums between 2003 and 2008. Other members of the band include ...

. In March 2017, the film was re-released as a

virtual reality Virtual reality (VR) is a simulated experience that employs pose tracking and 3D near-eye displays to give the user an immersive feel of a virtual world. Applications of virtual reality include entertainment (particularly video games), e ...

work, viewable on

Google Daydream Daydream is a discontinued virtual reality (VR) platform which was developed by Google, primarily for use with a headset into which a smartphone is inserted. It is available for select phones running the Android mobile operating system (versio ...

and

Google Cardboard Google Cardboard is a discontinued virtual reality (VR) platform developed by Google. Named for its fold-out cardboard viewer into which a smartphone is inserted, the platform was intended as a low-cost system to encourage interest and developme ...

Awards

In June 2012, Jam3 received a Gold Cyber Lion Award the Cannes Lions International Advertising Festival in the category of Charities, Public Health & Safety and Public Awareness Messages, for its work on ''Bear 71''. Also in June 2012,

Sheffield Doc/Fest Sheffield DocFest (formerly styled Sheffield Doc/Fest), short for Sheffield International Documentary Festival (SIDF), is an international documentary festival and Marketplace held annually in Sheffield, England. The Festival includes film sc ...

awarded Bear 71 the Sheffield Innovation Award sponsored by

BT Vision BT TV is a subscription IPTV service offered by BT; a division of United Kingdom telecommunications company BT Group, and was originally launched as BT Vision in December 2006. As of the end of June 2019, BT TV had 1.9 million customers. ...

. In December 2012, ''Bear 71'' was named the best non-fiction web series at the Digi Awards (formerly Canadian New Media Awards). On January 15, 2013, ''Bear 71'' was named Site of the Year for 2012 by the Favourite Website Awards. On April 30, 2013, ''Bear 71'' received the

Webby Award The Webby Awards are awards for excellence on the Internet presented annually by the International Academy of Digital Arts and Sciences, a judging body composed of over two thousand industry experts and technology innovators. Categories includ ...

for best internet art. The film also received Webby nominations for best public service & activism video, best use of interactive video and best green website.

References

External links

* * * {{NFB interactive works 2012 films Banff National Park Films about bears Individual animals in Canada Individual bears Individual wild animals National Film Board of Canada web documentaries Virtual reality films Webby Award winners 2010s Canadian films

Production

Release

Awards

See also

References

External links